Locust Grove High School football coach Clint Satterfield made a brief statement Wednesday calling the death of lineman Forest Jones “a tragedy” and said that the team will dedicate the season to him. But he did not answer any questions.
“I’m just not ready to do that right now,” Satterfield said.
Jones, 16, collapsed July 25 at a voluntary team workout and died Tuesday at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. His father said doctors believe the teen had suffered heatstroke or heat exhaustion.
“I just want to get a message to all these kids out there,” the grieving father said, “that your body tells you when it needs to rest. Listen to your body, tell your coaches, tell your parents.”
Locust Grove officials would not say Wednesday whether coaches were following the district’s heat policy when Jones collapsed.
On Wednesday, Henry County and several other metro Atlanta school districts canceled outdoor activities altogether or during the hottest part of the day following the deaths of Jones and a second player. DJ Searcy, a 16-year-old Fitzgerald High School defensive lineman, died Tuesday morning after practice in a camp in northern Florida. The cause of his death has not been determined.
Their deaths are among a half dozen, including one of a coach in Texas, that have been reported in recent weeks around the country in connection with football practices.
J.D. Hardin, a spokesman for Henry County Schools, said he didn’t know what precautions the coaches were taking, but he added, “obviously if they were out there, they were following protocol.”
Locust Grove principal Robyn Mullis spoke on the impact of Jones’ death: “We are deeply saddened at the school and in the community. It’s a somber environment.”
The workout was over and Jones was walking back to the fieldhouse when he fell to the ground, Hardin said. “He apparently fell, got back up and fell again,” the district spokesman said. “When [the coaches] saw Forest collapse, they rushed to his aid and called 911 immediately.”
Emergency medical technicians from the Henry County Fire Department arrived at the scene at 7:18 p.m. and within 10 minutes were transporting Jones to a local emergency room. Later that evening he was transferred to Children’s.
Five years ago, following the heat-related death of a football player in Rockdale County, the Georgia High School Association decreed that districts must adopt a heat policy. But that rule applies only for formal practices with pads and helmets, which cannot begin before Aug. 1. Before that date, adherence to the policy is voluntary.
On Tuesday, the GHSA issued a formal statement saying it was looking into the deaths. “The GHSA staff is gathering facts about these situations to evaluate whether our current standards for conducting practices are adequate,” it said.
The statement suggested, however, that individual school districts bear most of the responsibility for students’ safety. “It is important to understand that the GHSA only sets the beginning date that practices may occur in every sport,” the statement said. “The decisions about when to begin those practices and how to schedule those practices are left to the professional judgment of coaches and administrators.”
The head of the GHSA indicated Tuesday that he believes coaches at Locust Grove did observe the district’s policy July 25. “It is my understanding that Locust Grove High School takes a wet-bulb reading before every one of the voluntary workouts over the summer, including the one where the young man went down,” said Ralph Swearngin, executive director of the GHSA. A wet-bulb reading factors in heat and humidity.
Forest Jones’ father, Glenn Jones, said his son “pushed himself too hard.” He said Forest had wanted to be a professional football player since he was 10 years old. “He wanted to do it for me, so that when I got older he could take care of me.”
Jones said his 5-foot-8 son was a big boy but had slimmed down from 275 pounds to 240 since starting football in the spring. He worked hard at football and just as hard at his summer job with the family business, a wrecker service based in Jonesboro.
Forest was working to earn money to buy a car, but that effort was cut short. “He didn’t get a chance to get his driver’s license,” his father said.
Gina Hughes, whose son Lucas Hughes is a junior and one of Jones’ teammates, said the players have been participating in voluntary workouts all summer.
The day Jones collapsed, “it was hot, but it was not any different from any of the other days they’d gone out on their own,” she said. “It’s been hotter since.
“I’m a football mom,” she said. “I believe in those boys getting out there and working their butts off, but everyone has to stop and think.”
In 2009, the GSHA and University of Georgia researcher Mike Ferrara began a three-year study of the effects of extreme heat on high school athletes. At the time, Ferrara, who is director of the university’s athletic training education program, said that, in the absence of good data, policies differ widely from district to district.
“We have seen some policies that have been conservative while others have allowed practice to continue in extreme conditions,” he said.
On Wednesday, school districts in Henry County, Cherokee County, Cobb County, Atlanta and Decatur canceled outdoor after-school activities.
In Lawrenceville, a football player from Archer High School was on the mend after being transported to a hospital Tuesday morning during practice, said an official with Gwinnett County Public Schools.
Sloan Roach said transporting the student was precautionary.
“The word we received was that the student was doing fine,” Roach said.
A heat advisory remains in effect through this evening for most of metro Atlanta, with a forecast heat index of 108.
Staff writers Patrick Fox, Fran Jeffries and Mike Morris contributed to this article.
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